Turley Old Vine Zinfandel

I tend to lean towards Zinfandel’s when I eat spicy food. If you like a Chipotle sauce, try it with a Zinfandel. The Zin really enhances the spice.

I have a few bottles of Turley Zinfandel’s in my cellar, so I decided to pull the cork on the Turley 2006 Old Vine Zinfandel.

If you are not sure what the definition of “Old Vine” is, here you go: Grape vines can grow for over 120 years. After about 20 years vines start to produce smaller crops and average yields decrease, leading to more concentrated, intense wines. “Old vines” might apply to an entire estate, or it might mean only a certain parcel planted before others. In the U.S., the most common use is on zinfandel, because in California vineyards up to 125 years old are still bearing small amounts of prized Zinfandel fruit.

Many times when I first pull the cork I like to pour a little bit in my glass and examine it. Make sure you use something white in the back ground to really get a good look. I try to see how dark the wine looks (the purple color). The darker the wine the younger it is. In the case of the Turley Old Vine Zin, it was starting to look a little bricky (lighter the purple color is) and the edge of the wine was looking clear.

Here are my tasting notes on the bottle.

Color: The overall color was nice. You can see the color is not a deep red.

Nose: How did it smell? I could smell dark fruit, but it was faint.

Taste: A little spice on the front of my tongue with a smooth finish. When Chris had a sip she hummed.